Coheed and Cambria, Between the Buried & Me, Russian Circles

[HOT TOPIC PROG] Let’s get this out of the way: Russian Circles is a great, heavy instrumental post-rock band. But it’s not worth $27.50 to watch the band play a 30-minute set at 8 pm. Anyway, I love prog and metal and comics and science fiction, so I want to appreciate Coheed and Cambria. C&C guitarist-vocalist Claudio Sanchez writes entire graphic novels based on the band’s lyrical concepts. But even though latest album Afterman: Descension (yes, it’s the follow-up to last year’s Afterman: Ascension) comes with five trading cards if you buy it from Hot Topic, I’m still vomiting in my mouth even attempting to listen to the music on offer here. It really sounds like Jonathan Davis from Korn fronting Living Colour. Between the Buried and Me is better, retaining a more technical edge. But my friend who calls the group “Between the Boring and the Intros” is not wrong.